The development of Scienta’s FoilControl software package has been ongoing since 2012, and an important part of this development has been to minimise the use of foil. The various techniques such as Foilsave, multiple foil rolls and limited indexing have all contributed to making cold foil a more economic print enhancement capability. Limiting the foil usage to the print length can give large savings and this is recognised now by the large manufactures who have started to offer indexing on their new presses.

To enable new and existing retrofit foil systems to realise the same foil savings, Scienta has developed a retrofit indexer cassette called iFoilControl. This development has been a collaboration between Scienta, HPS and the largest user of cold foil in the UK.

The cassette uses the latest high speed mechatronic techniques and has been designed to index foil at normal press foiling speeds and also to fit within the confines of the foil unit. Potential savings will obviously depend on the print length and press configuration, for a full sheet, saving of up to 20% can be expected.